Hospital wipes Can Spread Germs Like MRSA
The use of disposable cloths to clean hospital equipment and rooms seems like a great idea but they can/t do the job very well a recent study has shown. The wipes as they are often used simply spread germs around on the surface of beds and other hospital some surfaces.
The Welsh School of Pharmacy found that Methicillin Resistant Staph Aureus was not killed by wipes. They further found that they could spread contamination.
An infection control specialist said killing bacteria instantly was not as vital as the need to tackling the dirt and debris on which they thrive.
Dr Gareth Williams, who shared findings at the American Society of Microbiology’s Annual Meeting in Boston, visited the intensive care units of some UK hospitals to observe how staff utilized disposable wipes, and that it is common for a single disposable wipe to be used for multiple surfaces.
“What I found was that staff would wipe one thing, perhaps a bed rail, then move on to several other surfaces, so we went back to the laboratory to see how different wipes performed under these conditions.”
Dr Williams discovered that the disposable wipes were effective at picking up bacteria from the first surface, however they did not kill the bacteria. Thus subsequent cleaning using the same wipe resulted in contamination.
One use only
Dr Williams said: “What is remarkable is that some of these wipes actually have the words ‘kills MRSA’ written on the box.
“We found that, under the conditions we observed in actual hospitals, this wasn’t the case.”
He said that hospital staff should be taught not to clean more than one thing with the same wipe, even if it is advertised as ‘anti-bacterial’.
ref: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/7432937.stm
